Link: Bendis on writing the Avengers and fan reactions to Avengers Disassembled

This quote is interesting:

Yeah, what I did when I first came on it, I didn't like the direction of the book at the time. And that's absolutely no dis to the creators who came before at all. But it was Jack of Hearts and characters that I just didn't want to write. I wanted to create this Avengers disaster movie. And I came in and blew up the mansion and people died and She-Hulk was ripping Vision apart. And yeah, I got hammered.

There were two things going on. I decided what was interesting to me would be to have a texture to the book that you haven't seen where the reader was actually physically on the Avengers team. Like I open it up and you're at the table with the Avengers. You're not up high, looking down. You're not looking from away from them. You're in the huddle. And I thought that would be an interesting point of view for the reader.

So I put you in the huddle with the Avengers. And then I blow it up! And that's an unappealing place to be. It's a disaster, right? So not only is it a disaster, but I put you in the middle of it. And really there's no difference between doing that and going into the playground and breaking all the toys. You're that kid. You're the kid who's going up to all the girls and pulling the arms off the dolls. And I realized that now.

At the time, I didn't mean for that feeling to happen. It didn't happen with everyone. That's not how everyone felt. But people who were mad at me felt that. And I totally get it. It's rude! There's no other word for it. They're completely enjoying the Avengers book, and I come along and ruin it.

But at the time, I was confused by the reaction. But I understand it now.

That's pretty apt.

Avengers was sucking hard when he took over, but Disassembled was even worse.

I gave New Avengers a try, but pretty much Bendis got me to stop reading Avengers after years and years, since the restart with Busiek and Perez. Which was especially disappointing because at the time I really liked Bendis.

To quote one of my favorite philosophers...

"What a maroon!"

Bendis made me quit Avengers too, after reading it faithfully since issue #151. I still haven't gone back and won't until he's gone.

QFE. That's pretty much how I felt. I got into comics around the Onslaught series and that included the Avengers, but when Bendis took over I just felt anger everytime I read an issue. I won't pick up the titles that he writes until he is gone.

(But everyone should faithfully pick up Dan Slott's Mighty Avengers because THAT is a true Avengers comic!)

Maybe I will.

I *like* Bendis is the right places, but his Avengers never clicked for me. Like I said, I did go back after Disassembled and gave it a solid try, but.... meh.

Three events have pretty much made me drop Marvel titles (with the exceptions of Ultimate Spider-Man and Incredible Hercules) - Civil War, Secret Invasion, and Brand New Day. BMB and Joe Quesada have pretty much driven me away, though I will give Bendis props for Powers and USM.

I guess I'm in the minority then, because I rather enjoyed Disassembled. What I haven't liked is the fad to never end a story that's followed ever since. Everything has to lead into something else.

I didn't mind Civil War, though I hated the way it ended. The other two I never even gave a chance. Brand New Day/One More Day smelled like tripe from a mile away. I didn't need to get any closer for confirmation.

Of course, I thoroughly enjoyed Back In Black and Pete embarassing the hell out of the Kingpin and not holding back in other situations. I think it could have been explored more, too.

Pompous jerk... Avengers fans didn't drop the book because we weren't comfortable with the point of view. He urinated on the book, stating publicly in a Wizard article that he didn't like the Avengers. He also said that fans of the old stuff weren't going to like what he did with it, and that he was gearing up for a post-Matrix audience.

I can still recall the horror or Iron Man defending Wolverine on the team to Cap by saying he's an "honorable samurai." Both of them know Wolverine wouldn't follow orders, and would never accept the insubordinate little runt.

Jewel, Spider-Man, ninjas, bad guys who were crispy-dead suddenly alive on the raft... utter Bendis swill. I dropped Marvel, and haven't gone back.

My problem with Bendis is that he puts his personal opinions before those of the readers and fans. Bendis thinks Jack of Hearts is lame? Kill him off. Ditto for Ant-Man. He thinks She-Hulk is lame? Completely ignore what's happening in her solo series and have her constantly break character and murder people. He thinks Speedball is lame? Turn him into a self-mutilating pariah. Conversely: Bendis has a mega-huge fanboy-crush on Spider-Woman, so he makes her the most important character in the entire Marvel Universe.

The only thing I've ever really liked by Bendis was "Alias"... And he made ALL of the above opinions quite clear during the course of that series. The Avengers - especially Ant-Man - are shown mostly as tight-wearing weirdos who can't keep their #### together. The characters constantly make jokes about how lame She-Hulk is. In one story Speedball shows up and is portrayed as a bumbling idiot who just plain ruins everything. And of course in the same story, Spider-Woman is there (I daresay she turns up in at least 90% of what Bendis writes, because he lurves her) and needless to say she is portrayed as an ultra-cool super-spy.

At the end of the day, he writes really good dialogue, is good-to-mediocre at writing action scenes, and is quite clearly too much of a fanboy himself to wield as much power as he does.

Truer words are seldom spoken. I don't know how writers get away with sacrificing continuity for excellent dialogue and mediocre stories.

Let's just hope that the upcoming Avengers book will bring us back to what was purely good about the team. Bringing back the marvel "Trinity" of Cap, Tony, and Thor will hopefully bring the Avengers back to the super-team they once were. I am pretty tired of all the "discension and turmoil within the team" concept. I realize that controversy sells books, supposedly, but so does a unified team of awesome core characters that kick villain or alien hiney from page to page. Let's get back to making heroes, heroes and villains, villains. I can't really even get started on "One more day". Being a long-time Spidey reader, it just made me sick.

Up until New Avengers, I was able to follow my Marvel universe without regard for the Avengers and what was happening with them. The Avengers were as much a self-contained universe as the X-men were, and I had no interest in what the Avengers roster had coming up.

What Bendis did, for me, is he said, "You can't ignore the Avengers any longer." And that's how it should have been all along. In the Marvel universe, the Avengers are Earth's Mightiest Heroes. They should be completely necessary to understand the Marvel Universe!

They took characters from all over: X, Knights, even those wonderful minis that you loved but figured were done with. They crammed them all into one book. And then they set those characters RIGHT ON THE PULSE of everything happening in the Marvel U.

Since Bendis came on board, I have not only begun to read EVERY Avengers story arc, but have even found myself BUYING Avengers books from time to time. Which, as someone who was adament about how lame the Avengers are, was a bit of an embarassment.

It used to be that meeting another Marvel fan didn't necessarily mean you read any of the same books. Now it's almost guaranteed.

Bendis is the reason I have switched my purchases monthly from DC to Marvel. New and Dark Avengers are gold. Daredevil and Alias are some of the trades that I still recommend to this day. The time he has taken to lay out stories over years (Secret Invasion) makes me appreciate the effort. It doesn't hurt that he probably does the best dialogue in comics.